


Throw Off Your Worries

by Jalules



Category: Gatchaman Crowds
Genre: Established Relationship, Gen, Other, Post-Finale, Shippy Gen, rambling about clothes and makeup, they pronouns for Rui, xe pronouns for X
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-29
Updated: 2013-09-29
Packaged: 2017-12-27 23:44:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/985054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jalules/pseuds/Jalules
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Rui comes home, it is to a different home than they are used to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Throw Off Your Worries

.

.

.

When Rui comes home, it is to a different home than they are used to. From the road outside to the stairs leading up and up to the floor that houses Rui’s world inside the world at large, the new apartment feels strange.

It’s just a touch unsettling.

That happens, though, when you move across town and into a new complex on the recommendation of a friend. Things feel different.

A small, off-white apartment in a row of dozens of other small, off-white apartments is quite the change from a sprawling penthouse of glass and stainless steel, with wall-sized screens at every turn, with a closet still full to bursting with clothes and shoes and carefully organized accessories.

But a small, off-white apartment is warmer, cozier than a steel and glass penthouse. It’s the bare essentials for a home, with still more bedrooms than they need, though only one contains a bed and it’s not as lavish as their old one. And while at times the smaller space can seem confining, it’s easier to maintain, quicker to move through.

The new apartment comes with none of the familiar dark corners that still vibrate with a disembodied laugh, with the threat of a diamond-sharp whip of a tail sneaking out and into view, out and around soft, fragile skin, winding tight and cutting off air, cutting-

 

Rui mentally shuts the door on that place, again and again. As many times as they need to.

They couldn’t possibly have stayed there. It was too much space anyway, that penthouse. Too much space for just the two of them.

Besides, the new apartment may be one in a row of tiny, identical spaces, but knowing that it is nestled directly beside a home occupied by a sunshine bright gatchaman and an odd, cobbled together family of friends and aliens makes the new and unfamiliar space feel that much safer, more inviting.

Hajime has already run through and strung up a polka dot canopy around the bed, thrown down a few bloated throw pillows in increasingly nauseating shades of green, with promises to be back soon with a round of quilts and tapestries to really liven up the place.

Rui always means to replace it all with something better suited to their own taste, and never quite gets around to it.

X says xe don’t mind, even though the pillows do encroach on the new, limited space designated for a screen that is as large as the main room will allow. While Rui has not directly asked if the colors are to xyr liking, they suspect that X might actually find them charming.

The pillows stay.

They are something soft to drop into, sometimes, when Rui comes home; to a still slightly foreign smell, to the sound of excited shouting and flustered bubbling next door, to the all too familiar chirp of X’s voice saying, “Welcome back, Rui,” although the two of them are rarely out of contact for more than five minutes over the course of a day.

 

With a pause at the door, a retina scan to be safe, X’s screen hums, fills with color as that same greeting sounds in stereo, from the wall on the left, from the speakers in the tablet in Rui’s hands.

Rui turns the tablet off, slides it onto the nearest table. They stride past the garish pillows and kick off a pair of pink combat boots that have begun to feel just a little too tight after a day spent walking on hard city concrete and cool office tile.

It’s probably the best part of the day, coming home and getting undressed.

Undressing is a ritual, just as important as putting clothes on in the first place, perhaps even more so. It is familiar and stress free, hardly any thought entering the process as layer after layer is shed. Aside from learning new places to drop accessories as they’re removed, remembering a new order to pack away what any other person would quickly deem ‘too many’ wigs, it’s all muscle memory put to use in a new environment.

Getting undressed after a long day feels more like coming home than anything, like a satisfying stretch and yawn, and making idle chatter with X along the way just makes it that much more relaxing.

“Did you complete the last of your errands for the day, Rui?”

“Hm,” Rui says, a noncommittal response as they pluck a headband of delicate fabric flowers from the short strands of a blonde wig. They think back to this afternoon, a little girl on the street commenting on it, eyes wide as she declared that Rui looked like a magical fairy.

They study it in their hands for a moment, consider investing in a pair of wings. Then, after finding a shelf to place the headband on, at least for the time being since half the hair accessories haven’t even been unpacked yet, they look back to X and add, “Yes. Everything except grocery shopping. Could you bump that to tomorrow?”

“Yes, Rui. Grocery shopping has been moved to tomorrow’s schedule, set at moderate priority,” X says, and waits till Rui’s taken off their wig and run a hand through slightly flattened hair to continue, “It might be worth noting that grocery shopping has been moved to a later day three times this week.”

Rui hums in thought and lays the wig down on the same shelf, making a mental note to brush it out later before putting it away, “Oh. Has it?”

Of course it has. Hajime keeps inviting them over for dinner, and someone they suspect is Utsutsu has been leaving boxes of slightly too-dry scones at the front door, which make a nice breakfast. Lunch is often a business affair, or something forgotten entirely in the midst of a busy day. With all those meals already seen to, it’s easy to put the chore of refilling the fridge on the back burner.

“Yes, Rui. This has been recorded as happening twice before, as well.”

An ongoing trend, then.

“Put it on the itinerary for tomorrow anyway, if you don’t mind,” Rui shrugs, smiling at their own carelessness. It’s nice, sometimes, to just wing it, “Perhaps I’ll get to it then.”

“Certainly, Rui.”

They pick the tablet up off the table, bring it along to the bedroom and switch it on again, to continue the conversation.

“X, could you read me the most critical updates for today, please?” Rui asks, and X chirps an affirmative. Propped up on a nightstand, the AI rattles off news about construction projects and hospital fundraising, takes note of which politicians are in the public’s favor at the moment and which are earning criticism. Rui listens attentively, wriggling free of a series of bracelets that get stacked up and set away in one of two jewelry boxes; the one reserved for warmer tones, this time.

Their jacket is shrugged off more gently, folded and held over one arm, a precious leather baby to be hung up with care. It gets stashed in a bedroom closet, in the room that is technically extra space and is slowly becoming more closet than room anyway. They come back around to the tablet as X finishes reading off the news for the day, and pauses a moment to ask a crucial question.

“X, do you mind me changing here?”

It’s become another step in the process, lately. Somewhere between the old apartment and this one, the room divider Rui slipped behind for modesty’s sake got lost in the shuffle.

Rui is not particularly broken up about it.

Asking X before undressing is more of a formality than anything, the same question always receiving the same answer.

“Of course not, Rui.”

So Rui undoes the clasp on their belt, slipping it free of their waist and hanging it over the bar of the closet designated for belts. They tug their dress up and off in one swift movement.

It lands on the floor, a pool of pale pink, and is quickly gathered up and dropped into a laundry basket. A pair of floral leggings follow, tugged inside out as Rui leans against the nearest wall for balance, freeing each leg of the stretchy fabric, first one, then the other. The touch of air against skin isn’t too shocking, bringing just enough of a shiver to be pleasant.

Free of each of the days accessories, Rui takes a deep breath, lets it out slow, thoughtful.

“No missed calls or messages, right?”

“No. Rui. I alerted you to all messages as they arrived.”

“Of course. Just double checking.”

Pajamas, then.

Rui stoops lower to go through the bottommost drawer inside the closet, selecting a pair of shorts, a loose top with thin straps. The clothes feel barely there compared to the layers of nylon and polyester from earlier. Very nearly perfectly comfortable, the feel of makeup still settled on their eyes, across their lips, becomes immediately more noticeable.

“I’ll be right in,” They tell X, and switch the tablet back off, going to wash up alone.

 

Taking off makeup is, on bad days, a tedious chore. On a good day, however (and Rui is finding more and more days lately to be good ones,) it is just another soothing step in the process of becoming undone. Scrubbing away the dusty pollution left by city air, the smooth layer of foundation and bright lipstick to reveal skin beneath, leaves Rui breathing easier, feeling lighter. Mascara is always a pain, leaving dark rings around their eyes as it’s washed away, but even on an off day, Rui finds it easy to laugh at their own raccoon faced reflection.

The giddy urge to snap a picture in the mirror, tongue stuck out and looking silly, to send to Hajime right next door, to hear a delighted laugh through the thin apartment walls and read the excited text babble that follows, or better yet, receive an even more ridiculous self-portrait in response, is an unfamiliar one.

Having more than one friend is strange, but not at all a bad thing.

Rui resists the urge, works the most stubborn smears of eyeliner off with makeup remover, and heads back to the main room feeling refreshed, making a quick side trip to the bedroom to pick up their tablet. There is one finishing touch, and it lies in a pair of red frames. Once their glasses are in place, things come back into focus, going crisp at the edges, neat and perfect. The frames, unlike any accessory they put on or take off, feel quite a part of Rui’s face, feel at home there.

Taking a seat on top of, partially against, a pile of acid green throw pillows signals the end of the undressing process. Everything is off and away, only freshly scrubbed skin and a bit of thin cotton sleepwear remaining with no sign that a person in heavy makeup and an alarmingly pink ensemble had ever entered the room.

Rui smiles and leans back, looks up at X’s screen mounted on the wall, and sighs a contented sort of sound.

The apartment next door is quiet, settling down just the same.

A blip of computerized sound breaks the silence.

“Rui…” X says, just loud enough to catch attention.

And Rui sits up straighter, half-afraid that this is the start of a warning, of an alert. X is about to bring up reports of a horrible train crash, a mysterious disease that has broken out and is spreading like wildfire, a monster with sharp teeth and a slanting, terrible smile that is already there-

A quick breath brings calm, brings focus. Now is not the time to panic. In fact, there is never really a good time to panic.

“What is it?”

X hesitates. Rui’s heart pounds harder, fear gripping their insides and working up into their throat, though it is not allowed anywhere near the brain, god forbid, not permitted to attack a single rational thought.

“I was just noticing,” X says, careful, “That Hajme Ichinose was correct. You look very lovely without makeup.”

Rui stares up at the screen, wheezes out a surprised laugh.

X is silent, presumably embarrassed. Rui feels immediately bad, but cannot quite stop laughing. It’s the last thing they expected to hear, and so much better than any of the worst case scenarios they’d been thinking, that it’s a hilarious sort of relief.

They think back on every comment Hajime has made about their chosen style, never hurtful, just a little blunt.

“I think what Hajime said is that I look better without makeup,” Rui says, finally, a minor correction.

X ponders that. The screen’s display shifts slightly, one cool green shade to another, nearing blue.

“Well,” X says, “I would not personally say better. Only lovely.”

Hearing it a second time still makes Rui laugh, a little, but mostly it makes their face feel hot. They think that they probably should have grown out of blushing over simple compliments by now.

“…thank you, X,” Rui says, slipping from amusement to affection in one soft sigh. They wish they could return the compliment, comment on some change or improvement X has made. But X is perfect, has always been perfect, and Rui cannot accurately express that in words.

They pick up the tablet instead.

Switched on, the screen comes alive, a gentle pulse of light, a flash of color. X is there, as xe are on the nearby screen, as xe are everywhere. 

“Thank you,” Rui says again, and holds the tablet up, inches from their face. And though it feels silly, feels childish, they close their eyes and press a kiss to one side of the screen, as gently as if the surface has never seen the smudge of lipstick or bare skin before.

X makes a small sound, almost surprised. With their forehead pressed against the screen, Rui can open their eyes and see the shifting tones of X’s logo go electric blue, fade down to soft, sleepy periwinkle.

“X?” Rui says, sitting back once more, regarding the screen of the tablet from a reclined position.

“Yes, Rui?”

“Move grocery shopping up to a high priority, could you?”

“Of course, Rui.”

They think maybe they’ll invite the neighbors over tomorrow for dinner.

.

.

.


End file.
